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Bucks Blog: Bigger Banks vs. Smaller, in Customer Satisfaction

April 25, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Many consumers love to hate big banks. But the largest banks have become better at making their customers happy, according to the latest study from J.D. Power and Associates.

Customer satisfaction with banks over all has risen from last year, mostly due to improvements at the biggest institutions, the company’s latest Retail Banking Satisfaction Study finds.

Over all, banking customer satisfaction rose to 763 points (on a 1,000-point scale), an increase of 10 index points over last year. The largest increase came from the “big banks” segment, which rose by 16 points. (The segment includes the six largest banks by deposits: Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citibank, U.S. Bank and PNC Bank.) The study solicited customers’ opinions about their primary bank in January. The report includes more than 120 banks.

The study assesses customer satisfaction in areas like account information, fees and problem resolution, and ranks banks in 11 regional markets: California, Florida, mid-Atlantic, Midwest, New England, North Central, Northwest, South Central, Southeast, Southwest and Texas.

The biggest banks are often outranked in various markets by smaller institutions. In New England, for instance, the top-ranked bank was Bangor Savings Bank, while national banks like Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase ranked below the region’s average. And in Texas, Frost National Bank led the rankings.

But smaller banks didn’t always win out. In the Midwest region, JPMorgan Chase topped the rankings, outscoring 22 other banks.

Big banks are still outranked by midsize banks overall (as a group, the midsize segment ranked 785 on the scale), but are closing the gap after a period in which new fees and the elimination of free checking accounts turned off customers. Now, fees have begun to “stabilize” and big banks are doing a better job of explaining their fee structures to customers, the report says. About a third of customers now say they “completely” understand their banks fees, up from about a quarter last year, the study reports.

Jim Miller, senior director of banking at J.D. Power, said in an interview that the big banks were doing a better job of reducing the number of problems that customers encountered and “executing on basic customer service.” The largest banks, like Chase, are also expanding their use of mobile banking technology. That makes it more convenient for customers to bank, which adds to their satisfaction.

Do you use a big bank? Are you satisfied with your treatment?

Article source: http://bucks.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/25/bigger-banks-vs-smaller-in-customer-satisfaction/?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Your Money Tagged With: , ,

Bucks Blog: Just 5 Banks Prohibit Use of Social Security Numbers

March 20, 2013 by Leave a Comment

Despite the risk of fraud associated with the theft of Social Security numbers, just five of the nation’s largest 25 banks have stopped using the numbers to verify a customer’s identity after the initial account setup, a new report from Javelin Strategy Research finds.

Social Security numbers are required to open a bank account, but shouldn’t be used after that as a requirement for initiating communications with the bank, Javelin says. Some banks, for instance, require customers to provide the numbers when calling on the phone to speak with a bank representative, or contacting the bank to reset a password.

Use of the numbers can make customers vulnerable to “account takeover,” in which a thief uses stolen information, like a Social Security number along with an address, to gain access to a bank account. About a third of account takeovers involve checking and savings accounts, according to Javelin’s most recent data.

“Everyone would be well served if we would step away from Social Security numbers,” Al Pascual, a senior analyst for security risk and fraud at Javelin, said in a phone interview. “It’s a powerful tool for a fraudster.”

In 2011, Javelin reported in its Banking Identity Safety Scorecard that all the banks in its report used the numbers in some way for customer identification.

This year, five banks reported that they now prohibit their use — an improvement, the report said, but still “distressingly low.”

The five that reported prohibiting the use of the numbers are Comerica, Regions Bank, TD Bank, U.S. Bank and Union Bank. The country’s biggest banks, including JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America and Citibank, still use Social Security numbers, according to the report.

Prohibiting use of the customer’s Social Security number to verify identity “may go a long way” toward protecting customers’ accounts, the report said.

Overall, however, the report gave top marks to Bank of America for prevention and detection of identity fraud, and gave Chase the top ranking for resolving problems once they occur.

Does your bank ask for your Social Security number when you call to discuss your account?

Article source: http://bucks.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/20/just-5-banks-prohibit-use-of-social-security-numbers/?partner=rss&emc=rss

Filed Under: Your Money Tagged With: , ,

U.S. Market Indexes Up Sharply

August 30, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Wall Street surged in a broad rally on Monday as a merger between big Greek banks provided rare encouraging news from debt-stricken Europe, while a rebound in American consumer spending calmed fears of a new recession.

At the close, the Standard Poor’s 500-stock index was up 33.28 points, or 2.8 percent, at 1,210.08. The Dow Jones industrial average of 30 blue-chip stocks rose 254.71 points, or 2.26 percent, to 11,539.25. The Nasdaq composite index was up 82.26 points, or 3.32 percent, at 2,562.11.

Since Aug. 8, when the S. P. 500 hit its recent low of 1,119.46, the index has risen about 8 percent.

Since the Dow’s recent low of 10,719.94 on Aug. 10, the average has gained about 7.4 percent and is within about 50 points of where it started the year.

Financial stocks were the greatest gainers on Monday after Alpha Bank and Eurobank EFG sealed a merger that was expected to prompt more deals to shore up a sector battered by the euro zone’s debt crisis and recession.

The banks “need to strengthen their balance sheets, and this would help with that, making the sector less worrisome,” said David Ruff, portfolio manager at the Forward Select EM Dividend Fund in San Francisco.

“We’ll probably need to see greater policy action in the region,” Mr. Ruff said. “But the merger needs to be done, and that’s why we’re seeing a pause in the recent selling pressure.”

The S. P. financial index was up 3.4 percent and the KBW Banks index added 3.6 percent. Bank of America rose 8.12 percent to $8.39 and JP Morgan Chase gained 4 percent to $37.64. New York-listed shares of National Bank of Greece soared 37.7 percent to $1.15.

Insurers also rose as property damage from Hurricane Irene was less than feared, according to early estimates. Travelers rose 5.1 percent to $50.75, while Allstate jumped 7.6 percent to $26.30.

Oil prices were up $1.90, to $87.27 a barrel. They extended gains from Friday, when they rose on the possibility of new stimulus from the Fed. The Fed chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, left the door open for such stimulus in a speech on Friday in Jackson Hole, Wyo.

Mr. Bernanke, in his annual address to central bankers, gave no details on whether the Fed was planning to flood markets with more dollars to help the economy. But he said the central bank’s policy panel would meet for two days next month instead of one to discuss additional monetary stimulus, offering hopes of a move then.

Some analysts say it may be hard for Mr. Bernanke and the Fed to follow through with another round of bond buying after the $600 billion program that expired in June.

“He has a much, much harder decision this time,” Jim Walker, founder of Asianomics, told Reuters television. “What he’s got to do is convince the dissenting voices in the Fed — and there are now three of them — that economic growth is so bad that it is time to use even more extraordinary measures.”

Commodities around the world have had a volatile month, and gold prices fell again on Monday. Gold futures were down $5.70 to $1,788.40. “With a possibility of a stimulus package from the Fed in the weeks ahead, risk appetite seems to have returned to the markets and safe havens are being dumped,” said Pradeep Unni, senior analyst at Richcomm Global Services.

The Treasury’s 10-year note fell 21/32, to 98 25/32. The yield rose to 2.26 percent, from 2.19 percent late Friday.

Consumer spending recorded its largest increase in five months in July, supporting views that the economy was not falling back into recession. While the number of signed contracts for home sales in July fell 1.3 percent, the decline matched forecasts and topped year-ago levels.

“Consumer spending has been focused on the past couple of months, so any kind of strength there is a good thing for the economy and the market,” said Brian Lazorishak, portfolio manager at Chase Investment Counsel in Charlottesville, Va.

The New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq opened on schedule, but trading volume was light. Many workers were stuck at home because many commuter rail and bus lines were not operating the day after Hurricane Irene swept the region.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=eabbf145fca502ee010b01ce72d40812

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